Cryonics paid with Bitcoins

[cosmicalstorm]

I wish this man the best of luck on this bet he makes, also like that he make me feel a bit like living in cyberpunk. I realize the bitcoin part is a bit silly.

Bitcoin’s Earliest Adopter Is Cryonically Freezing His Body To See The Future

Some bitcoin enthusiasts have used their cryptocurrency to travel around the world. Others have spent it on a trip to space. But the very earliest user of bitcoin (after its inventor Satoshi Nakamoto himself) has now spent his crypto coins on the most ambitious mission yet: to visit the future.

Hal Finney, the renowned cryptographer, coder, and bitcoin pioneer, died Thursday morning at the age of 58 after five years battling ALS. He will be remembered for a remarkable career that included working as the number-two developer on the groundbreaking encryption software PGP in the early 1990s, creating one of the first “remailers” that presaged the anonymity software Tor, and—more than a decade later—becoming one of the first programmers to work on bitcoin’s open source code; in 2009, he received the very first bitcoin transaction from Satoshi Nakamoto.1

Now Finney has become an early adopter of a far more science fictional technology: human cryopreservation, the process of freezing human bodies so that they can be revived decades or even centuries later.

Just after his legal death was declared Thursday at 9 a.m., Finney’s body was flown to a facility of the cryonics firm known as the Alcor Life Extension Foundation in Scottsdale, Arizona. As of Thursday night, Finney’s blood and other fluids were being removed from his body and slowly replaced with a collection of chemicals that Alcor calls M-22, which the company says are designed to be as minimally toxic as possible to his tissues while preventing the formation of ice crystals that would result from freezing and destroy his cell membranes.

Over the next few days, the temperature of his body will be slowly lowered to -320 degrees Fahrenheit. Eventually, it will be stored in an aluminum pod inside a 10-foot tall tank filled with 450 liters of liquid nitrogen designed to keep him in that state of near-complete suspended animation. “That’s where he’ll remain until such time as we have technologies to repair the problems he had such as ALS and the aging process,” says Max More, Alcor’s director and Finney’s friend of many years. “And then we can bring Hal back happy and whole again.”

No human, to be clear, has ever been revived from a state of cryonic freezing. Many scientists consider the idea impossible. But Finney’s wife Fran says that doubters never stopped her husband from exploring a technology that intrigued him.

“Hal respects other people’s beliefs, and he doesn’t like to argue. But it doesn’t matter to him what other people believe,” says Fran, who alternatingly spoke about her husband in the present and past tense. “He has enough confidence in how he figures things out for himself. He’s always believed he could find the truth, and he doesn’t need to convince anyone.”

In fact, Finney and his wife both decided to have their bodies cryonically frozen more than 20 years ago. At the time, Finney, like Alcor’s president More, was an active member of the Extropians, a movement of technologists and futurists focused on transhumanism and life extension. “He’s always been optimistic about the future,” says Fran. “Every new advance, he embraced it, every new technology. Hal relished life, and he made the most of everything.”

Finney was also an avowed libertarian and well-known figure within the cypherpunks, another early ’90s, mailing-list-centered group focused on empowering individuals with encryption, preserving privacy, and foiling surveillance. Finney created the first so-called “cypherpunk remailer,” a piece of software that would receive encrypted email and bounce messages to their destinations to prevent anyone from identifying the sender. He also became the first coder to work with Phil Zimmermann on Pretty Good Privacy or PGP, the first freely available strong crypto tool, and designed the software’s “web-of-trust” model of verifying PGP users’ identities.

That same forward-looking spirit led Finney to embrace bitcoin before practically anyone other than its creator thought it might be a viable system, let alone a multi-billion dollar economy. Finney spotted Satoshi Nakamoto’s bitcoin whitepaper on a cryptography mailing list in 2008 and immediately began exchanging emails with him, eventually helping to debug its code, perform its first test transactions, and mine a substantial hoard of the cryptocurrency. “I’ve noticed that cryptographic graybeards…tend to get cynical. I was more idealistic; I have always loved crypto, the mystery and the paradox of it,” Finney wrote on the BitcoinTalk forum last year. “When Satoshi announced Bitcoin on the cryptography mailing list, he got a skeptical reception at best…I was more positive.”

Finney’s positivity extended to his personal interactions, too. Colleagues from as early as college say he was as kind and generous as he was brilliant. “Hal is a rare genius who never had to trade his emotional intelligence to get his intellectual gifts,” Zimmermann told me in an email when I was writing a profile of Finney last March. “He is a fine human being, an inspiration for his attitude toward life. I wish I could be like him.”

Even Finney’s ALS diagnosis in 2009 didn’t slow his technological experimentation. As paralysis set in, he continued to contribute to bitcoin discussions and write code using software that translated his eye movements into text. He even created software that allowed him to use his eyes to adjust his own mechanized wheelchair’s position.

When I visited Finney in his Santa Barbara home earlier this year, his eye control was beginning to fail, too, and he was mostly reduced to delivering yes-and-no answers to my questions based on eyebrow movements. Even then, he was extraordinarily kind—he spent the first 10 minutes of our conversation composing a sentence on his computer telling me not to feel bad that I had gotten caught in traffic and arrived 15 minutes late.

Finney never quite got rich from his early bitcoin involvement, according to Fran. Much of their savings went toward his health care as his condition deteriorated. They traded the majority of his bitcoins for dollars long before the currency’s spike in value late last year.

After my story on Finney’s life and work, bitcoiners donated 25 bitcoins to Finney and his family, a sum that’s worth close to $12,500 today. Initially, Fran Finney tells me, the family intended to spend that money to buy Finney a new computer interface that would use an electromyographic (EMG) switch to read electric signals from surface muscle, allowing him to better control his voice and writing software. But the interface was incompatible with the few muscles Finney still controlled, leaving him locked in a body that increasingly prevented him from communicating at all.

So instead, the bitcoin donations will now go toward Finney’s cryonic procedures, along with a life insurance policy the Finneys have maintained for years to prepare for Alcor’s substantial fee. “Once we realized that Hal wasn’t going to be able to use the EMG switch, this was our next choice,” says Fran. “The bitcoins will cover a large fraction of the cost.”

Already, Fran says, the idea that her husband has been preserved in some sense comforts her. “It isn’t going to take away the fact that he’s not here now,” she says. “But it’s been very calming and reassuring for me to know that he might come back.”

Around the time of his diagnosis, Finney said he found that his cryonics plan gave him some comfort, too. “It was actually extremely reassuring as the reality of the diagnosis sunk in,” he wrote in 2009. “I was surprised, because I’ve always considered cryonics a long shot. But it turns out that in this kind of situation, it helps tremendously to have reasons for hope, and cryonics provides another avenue for a possibly favorable outcome.”

Fran Finney says that her husband had no illusions about the certainty of his resurrection. But until his final moments, he put his faith in the progress of technology. “He never said to me, ‘I will come back.’ But he told me, ‘I hope to be back,’” Fran says. “Hal liked the present. But he looked towards the future. He wanted to be there. And this is his way to get there.”

1Correction 8/29/2014: An earlier version of this story stated that Finney received the first bitcoin transaction from Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008. In fact it occurred in January, 2009.

http://www.wired.com/2014/08/hal-finney/

[Me2005]

The part that always confuses me with cryogenic freezing is that the people have to die as a prerequisite. Wouldn't it be more likely that the tech would work/be successful if they were almost dead at the outset? Is there anyone out there willing to try to be frozen and reconstituted so we can see if this is, in fact, actually possible at all?

If he's dead and the doctors can't bring him back now, what is anyone going to do after however many decades with a frozen pile of human? Going hours without oxygen and blood flow isn't good for the brain/body, so unless they had him on life support the whole trip, I don't see how there's ever going to be anything worth thawing out.

[Zixinus]

The part that always confuses me with cryogenic freezing is that the people have to die as a prerequisite. Wouldn't it be more likely that the tech would work/be successful if they were almost dead at the outset? Is there anyone out there willing to try to be frozen and reconstituted so we can see if this is, in fact, actually possible at all?

If he's dead and the doctors can't bring him back now, what is anyone going to do after however many decades with a frozen pile of human? Going hours without oxygen and blood flow isn't good for the brain/body, so unless they had him on life support the whole trip, I don't see how there's ever going to be anything worth thawing out.

The people doing this are convinced that technology will overcome all barriers, solve all problems and that what any attitude of "this is impossible" is all in the same vain as "man was not meant to fly and will never conquer the air".
Broadly they will believe that nanotech will somehow cure them not just from their disease but every and any damage the whole freezing process has done.

While also assuming that the company keeping their brains or bodies frozen will not go under and will not pull the plug on these people; and that future generations will also remain optimistic instead of just using the frozen tissue for some obscure research project or just plain recycle them; and also assuming that in whatever future this will happen these people will be welcomed or it itself will be welcoming*.

I may be exaggerating a bit, but the whole thing really is just the most optimistic burial possible.

*I personally like Transmetropolitan's take of it: yeah they have the nanotech to do it and manage to essentially remake the body of the person healthy and young, but the future is so vastly different that 20th century people just can't handle it and end up as reclusive bums. Add to the fact that any skills they have are woefully outdated (I have a hard time of thinking of a skill that can be used as-is centuries into the future and retain its value) and may not have any of their past possessions/finances, and you see why they are bums.

[Borgholio]

The part that always confuses me with cryogenic freezing is that the people have to die as a prerequisite. Wouldn't it be more likely that the tech would work/be successful if they were almost dead at the outset? Is there anyone out there willing to try to be frozen and reconstituted so we can see if this is, in fact, actually possible at all?

If he's dead and the doctors can't bring him back now, what is anyone going to do after however many decades with a frozen pile of human? Going hours without oxygen and blood flow isn't good for the brain/body, so unless they had him on life support the whole trip, I don't see how there's ever going to be anything worth thawing out.

Well that's something future medicine has to figure out. I mean a hundred years ago who would have thought you can restart someone's heart with a jolt of electricity or cure a disease such as the Plague or smallpox with a simple little pill? Thing is that there is so much we have today that would have seemed impossible a century ago. Even today we see advancements in robotics and prosthetics that could not be forseen even a decade ago. Who knows what they'll be capable of doing a century from now?

[cosmicalstorm]

I have had some contact with advocates of this and I want to add that many are extremely aware of the awful odds that goes with this.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Well that's something future medicine has to figure out. I mean a hundred years ago who would have thought you can restart someone's heart with a jolt of electricity

AFAIK, a hundred years ago was right on that one. A defibrillator will get a heart back into a proper rhythm but won't actually restart a heart that has stopped. I think you use lots of adrenaline directly injected for that.

[Borgholio]

A defibrillator will get a heart back into a proper rhythm but won't actually restart a heart that has stopped.

I honestly did not know that. Read up a bit and yeah it's true. Huh...good thing to know.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Yeah its one of many myths about medicine you get in TV shows and films, like frankly awful and dangerous depictions of CPR (and I don't just mean that it actually revives people) but the methods TV characters, even doctors use is realy annoying. Every time I taught a class CPR I had to preface it with "do not expect them to wake up." That and "don't be surprised if you hear/feel ribs cracking."

EDIT: A better example for that "a hundred years ago this was thought ludicrous" would be nukes...I mean, really, leveling a city by smashing two small(ish) pieces of heavy metal together? No way right?

[Borgholio]

Yes with regards to CPR, the biggest lesson we were taught in school was to use the two-finger method to locate the xiphoid process so you don't accidentally snap it off during the compressions.

[Darmalus]

I have had some contact with advocates of this and I want to add that many are extremely aware of the awful odds that goes with this.

In the end you simply can't get more dead. If it doesn't work you've lost nothing, if it does work you get another chance. I've yet to meet anyone interested in cryonics who wouldn't prefer to avoid the whole dying part in the first place.

[Starglider]

Wouldn't it be more likely that the tech would work/be successful if they were almost dead at the outset?

Not significantly. The really hard challenges are (in order) repairing freezing damage, restarting all life processes from a (literally) cold start, curing whatever the person died of (possibly old age) and preventing renewed decomposition from thawed bacteria (which become viable after defrost much more easily than human cells). The extra degeneration from waiting an hour or two to freeze someone doesn't make a big difference.

[Zixinus]

A question: from the standpoint of information theory, just how much is lost during the freezing process? That is where I am skeptical of the thing the most: even if future super-technology comes around that can do this, wouldn't the brains be too damaged to learn how they were originally constructed? Plus wouldn't this information decay over time (by radioisotopes in the organic tissue if nothing else)?

[Simon_Jester]

The brain is massively redundant in an information-theoretic sense, because while data is stored in tiny microscopic cells on the human scale, on the atomic scale each individual brain cell is huge.

So IF we posit insane-singularitarian technology that can in fact do detailed computation and analysis of matter at the atomic level... I bet you could reconstruct someone's brain with reasonable accuracy from considerably more damage than is required to freeze them solid. As long as the brain cells aren't physically rotted away and chemically transformed into other substances, it should be doable.

Radioisotope damage is insignificant by comparison.

[PKRudeBoy]

I have to say, this techno-immortality bid paid for in an electronic cryptocurrencey, combined with other recent trends makes me think Gibson was as precognitive as Verne.

[Broomstick]

Well that's something future medicine has to figure out. I mean a hundred years ago who would have thought you can restart someone's heart with a jolt of electricity or cure a disease such as the Plague or smallpox with a simple little pill?

Well, for starters (or, if you prefer, re-starters) Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which features re-animating a dead body with electricity, was first published in 1818... or 196 years ago. So it was hardly inconceivable 200, much less 100, years ago.

Even so, the problem of skills obsolescence is an issue for the revived. A few might find employment as living museum pieces or as eyewitnesses for historians and linguists, but the future will probably have plenty enough people they won't need to revive the frozen.

[Borgholio]

Well, for starters (or, if you prefer, re-starters) Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which features re-animating a dead body with electricity, was first published in 1818... or 196 years ago. So it was hardly inconceivable 200, much less 100, years ago.

Point taken, but I was referring to the general medical community as a whole. I don't think anybody really took inspiration from the novel...

[Darmalus]

Even so, the problem of skills obsolescence is an issue for the revived. A few might find employment as living museum pieces or as eyewitnesses for historians and linguists,

Honestly I can't see any future more than a few decades out where most of humanity isn't born obsolete right from the get-go, so I doubt future welfare will have any trouble absorbing a few thousand optimistic dinosaurs.

but the future will probably have plenty enough people they won't need to revive the frozen.

The program I'm familiar with invests your fee and uses the resulting funds for maintenance, R&D and revival (when finally possible). So they are actually required to revive you when it becomes feasible, they aren't relying on future charity to bring people back.

[Terralthra]

Well that's something future medicine has to figure out. I mean a hundred years ago who would have thought you can restart someone's heart with a jolt of electricity or cure a disease such as the Plague or smallpox with a simple little pill?

Well, for starters (or, if you prefer, re-starters) Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which features re-animating a dead body with electricity, was first published in 1818... or 196 years ago. So it was hardly inconceivable 200, much less 100, years ago.

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein doesn't mention electricity at all. The conceit of reviving the monster with a lightning bolt originates, so far as I remember, in 1931's Frankenstein. Certainly, it's an addition by film versions, that is not present in the novel.

[Zixinus]

The program I'm familiar with invests your fee and uses the resulting funds for maintenance, R&D and revival (when finally possible). So they are actually required to revive you when it becomes feasible, they aren't relying on future charity to bring people back.

Even so, the problem of skills obsolescence is an issue for the revived. A few might find employment as living museum pieces or as eyewitnesses for historians and linguists, but the future will probably have plenty enough people they won't need to revive the frozen.

One can create a fund for themselves in case they are revived (I believe that the company doing the freezing will give you advice on that) or just leave a sufficiently big bank account that will grow into a substantial funds for yourself. Of course this assumes that the fund will remain competently managed, the funds won't become worthless due to unforeseeable hyper-inflation, that the funds won't be hijacked/drained, the company and bank responsible won't end up in the middle of a nuclear exchange, etc. Or as a super-emergency backup, ask for inherently-valuable gold items to be frozen with your head.

But really, compared to the odds of your body/brain being kept intact until the possibly-happening singularity-tech comes around to revive you whole, that is a minor risk and problem.

[Jaepheth]

I'm of the opinion that the best shot at immortality right now is to have your dead brain sliced into micron-thin layers to be scanned and archived in a computer. Seems that computing power keeps exploding and that you'll be able to load and run a brain model sooner than repair a broken body. That shorter time to reawakening will greatly increase the chances of reawakening at all.

[Borgholio]

That's not immortality...that's killing you and creating a virtual clone. No thanks.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

That's not immortality...that's killing you and creating a virtual clone. No thanks.

That'll probably be what "the future" ends up doing with frozen corpsicles. After all, what would be the most valuable part of a person from the distant past? Not their broken bodies or their hopelessly obsolete skill-sets, but their experiences and memories.

And, since, becoming a corpsicle will pretty thoroughly kill you to begin with ... being scanned in for an interactive museum display would be a far better option than anything else they might decide to do with you.

[Darmalus]

That's not immortality...that's killing you and creating a virtual clone. No thanks.

That'll probably be what "the future" ends up doing with frozen corpsicles. After all, what would be the most valuable part of a person from the distant past? Not their broken bodies or their hopelessly obsolete skill-sets, but their experiences and memories.

And, since, becoming a corpsicle will pretty thoroughly kill you to begin with ... being scanned in for an interactive museum display would be a far better option than anything else they might decide to do with you.

Unless the company gets dissolved/wiped out and your corpsicle winds up in new hands, this would actually be a pretty nasty violation of contract. Might make for an interesting sci-fi story, massive class-action lawsuit by a bunch of digital clones for contract violations and the murders if their info-parents.

[Borgholio]

That's not immortality...that's killing you and creating a virtual clone. No thanks.

That'll probably be what "the future" ends up doing with frozen corpsicles. After all, what would be the most valuable part of a person from the distant past? Not their broken bodies or their hopelessly obsolete skill-sets, but their experiences and memories.

And, since, becoming a corpsicle will pretty thoroughly kill you to begin with ... being scanned in for an interactive museum display would be a far better option than anything else they might decide to do with you.

The issue I have is that of termination of consciousness. This is an old topic dating back to ideas of how the Federation transporter works, but it's still a valid concern. If my consciousness remains intact while transferring me to a computer, then I might be ok with it. But if my brain is taken apart, and a digital copy is made while terminating the biological copy...that's death. I would die and my clone would live.

[Terralthra]

Until and unless you can give me concrete, testable definitions for "consciousness" and "termination", then I'm going to submit to you that whenever you're put under a general anesthetic, you awaken as a clone of you and your original mind died.